A SCANNER DARKLY (2006) - Bob Arctor/Fred/Bruce
Let's see if we can't plow through the next 14 years of filmography, shall we?
I rewatched "A Scanner Darkly" last night, a movie I had seen in the theater in 2006 and promptly forgot about entirely because this movie might as well have been brand new to me and I have to say when all is said and done, this one might end up being right around the top 10 movies in this project.
Wow, what a good movie!
Before I start, a quick shout out to one of the two Keanu podcasts I'm still actively listening to as they actually mentioned this blog by name on their newest episode, which happened to be this movie. The podcast is called We Do Keanu and of the five Keanu filmography podcasts I've come across in the course of this project it is easily the best. Perhaps my opinion is biased because the two guys that do this podcast seem to have overlapping tastes with me and sound the most educated about movies and pop culture both in a general sense but also specific to Keanu Reeves even if one of them kind of hated "Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey," which is, of course, ridiculous. I mean the other podcast I'm still listening to had all three hosts LIKE "Something's Gotta Give," and one guy has "The Watcher" in his top ten Keanu movies. So clearly, they are all morons and the guy that liked "The Watcher" might actually have some sort of mental disability.
Okay, moving on to "A Scanner Darkly."
"A Scanner Darkly" is based on a Phillip K. Dick novel of the same name and I erroneously stated in my last post that this movie is filmed in gyroscope rather than rotoscope because I am an idiot.
This is a gyroscope:
Gyroscope: Not used to make movies
And this is rotoscope, which is a type of animation that really seems like a pain in the ass to make:
Our hero, rotoscoped!
I didn't have time to do too much research on rotoscope or this movie before writing this post, but my understanding is that they filmed this in the same manner they'd film any other movie, however they then took all the footage and animated over it frame by frame. I'm not entirely sure why this was necessary for this movie aside from one aspect which I will get to momentarily, and I don't think it really added nor detracted much at all from the movie aside from the fact that for the duration of the movie I kept thinking about a series of commercials from the mid to late 2000's that used this type of animation....I think it was for iTunes? I tried to find these commercials on Youtube but came up empty after a few minutes of searching.
I've never read any Phillip K. Dick books but they've made a handful of movies from them, all of which I've enjoyed including "Total Recall" (1990 version) and "Minority Report." And yes, one of these days I'll finally get around to both "Blade Runner" movies and if I ever start reading books again maybe I'll pick one of these up.
Okay, how about a quick synopsis of "A Scanner Darkly?" As always, full and complete SPOILERS ahead:
The movie takes place in the near future where 20% of the US population is addicted to a drug known as Substance D. Keanu Reeves is Bob Arctor, an undercover cop who is living with a couple of Substance D addicts tasked with helping the cops infiltrate the Substance D ring and help find the suppliers, because more and more addicts are winding up at "New Path," the only treatment center for drug abusers.
However, Keanu Reeves is known only as "Fred" to the police and is basically anonymous to them because whenever he's doing official police work he wears a "scramble suit" as all the cops do. As far as I could tell, this was the only thing that necessitated the rotoscoping in this movie, I'm assuming due to budgetary reasons that would have made this too expensive with CGI.
The scramble suit allows for the cops to work completely anonymously and even disguises their voices so nobody really knows who anyone is.
In fact, early in the movie, "Fred" is told by his higher up, "Hank" (also in a scramble suit) that he needs to be surveilling Bob Arctor, who is actually himself. Get it?
So Bob is living in his deteriorating house with two other guys - Barris, played brilliantly here by Robert Downey Jr in some pre-"Ironman" work and Ernie, also played really well by Woody Harrelson. He's also got a "girlfriend" of sorts, Donna, played here by Winona Ryder in her second team-up with Keanu after "Dracula." The problem though is that Donna won't really let Bob ever touch her let alone fuck her, so the relationship is a little weird if not entirely dysfunctional.
There are a handful of scenes in the first half of the movie of Bob hanging out with his housemates which provide some legitimately laugh out loud moments, like when Barris attempts to make a homemade silencer for his gun but ends up "augmenting" it instead.
There is a lot of drugged out dialogue, most of which is pretty funny but also full of mistrust and paranoia and we never necessarily know what is or what isn't going on, particularly because Bob himself has become a Substance D addict and his mind stops working properly, as described in a handful of scenes where he's physically examined by a couple of doctors.
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| Man, woman, person, TV, Camera |
Bob is led to believe that his girlfriend Donna is actually the person with the connection to Substance D suppliers.
Meanwhile, Barris goes to the cops and speaks with "Fred" and "Hank," letting them know that he suspects his roommate Bob of being a big-time drug kingpin but of course the joke is on him because he's giving this patently false information to Bob himself.
This is all a lot less confusing than it seems.
The final part of the movie leads us to the big twist (COMPLETE SPOILERS AHEAD ONCE AGAIN SO DON'T SAY I DIDN'T WARN YOU):
Bob, as "Fred" goes back to speak with "Hank" after Barris unintentionally gets himself detained by the police. By this point, Bob is a full-blown Substance D addict. He doesn't really know reality from fiction, he's seeing hallucinations and his brain is not functioning properly. "Hank" tells him that he's fucked in the head and calls "Donna" to come pick him up from the police station, but shortly thereafter, we see "Hank" remove his scramble suit only to reveal that HE'S BEEN DONNA THIS WHOLE TIME!
An astute viewer could have seen this coming as it's suggested early in the when "Hank" tells "Fred" that he knows he's definitely someone on the house and could even be Bob Arctor.
Anyway, what's actually going on is just a tad bit fucked up - it turns out that Bob has been setup by the cops to become an addict and get sent off the the New Path treatment facility because they are actually the ones manufacturing and distributing Substance D in the first place.
The movie concludes with Bob Arctor, now a complete zombie being called Bruce by the Substance D workers working on a farm, cultivating the small flower used to make Substance D. Winona Ryder and her partner are hoping that Bob will clean up and come to his senses and help them expose New Path as the criminal drug gang they are.
The end.
The movie is a little dark, especially when we realize that Bob has in a way been double-crossed by the people he works for and ends on a bit of an ambiguous note. Will Bob get clean and expose New Path? Will he remain a zombie and end up being completely useless to the cops who put him in this position in the first place? We will never know.
I will say, this movie was thoroughly entertaining and really well done. It's surprisingly funny in various parts yet disturbing and depressing in others.
Some scattered thoughts:
*Hey, it's the second movie where Keanu Reeves (sort of) interacts with cats!
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| COVID AND Substance D miracle cure! |
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| Maybe the MyPillow guy should look into this |
*Really great performances all around and a really entertaining script, which apparently didn't stray very far from the novel. It's a little surprising because a lot of the drug-talk banter seemed at least partially improvised but turned out to in many cases be taken straight from the novel.
*Many of the actors in this movie have at some time or another gotten themselves into trouble over drug related issues including Woody Harrelson, Robert Downey Jr and Winona Ryder but NOT Keanu Reeves. I don't know, I find that interesting.
Box Office Information: $5.5 Million Domestic ($7.6 Million inflation adjusted)/$2 Million International for $7.5 Million worldwide on a $20 Million budget. Apparently I was one of the few people to see this movie in theaters as you might say this was a bomb. It was just the 194th highest grossing movie of 2006. Woof.
Rotten Tomatoes: 68% Critics, 74% Audience. I'm honestly surprised both of these numbers are not higher.
IMDB: 7.1
My Movie Rating: 8/10. I really enjoyed this even if the rotoscoping was a little distracting at parts. Given the limited budget, I understand why they might have decided to go this way with the movie if they couldn't afford the CGI or other visual effects.
Keanu Rating: 9/10. I almost feel bad because in a lot of ways, Robert Downey Jr. stole this movie and deserves an 11/10 for his performance. But this isn't the Robert Downey Jr. Project. Keanu is also really good in this, especially as he starts to deteriorate into a full-blown addict.
Up Next: Oh boy, it's finally time for "The Lake House." Never seen it, but it IS a great episode of How Did This Get Made. I hope it's at least funny bad and not just bad bad.
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